Novel Full Chapter 1806: A Shadow
Chapter 1806: A Shadow
The moment Max stepped into the Emotion Severing Path Chamber, the door behind him closed without making even the faintest sound, sealing him inside a darkness that felt far more absolute than the absence of light.
There was no flash of brilliance, no grand welcome, and not even a system prompt explaining what he needed to do next. The chamber before him was completely dark, but this darkness was not ordinary darkness.
It was still, cold, and empty, as though sound, color, warmth, and even emotion itself had been severed from this place long before he arrived.
Max stood there in silence with Dragonheart in his hand, while the little cursed eye attached to his shoulder blinked once before becoming strangely quiet, as if even the Witch’s curse mark did not dare to move carelessly inside this chamber.
Max calmly looked around, but there was no sky above him, no ground beneath him that his eyes could see, no walls around him, and no visible end to the space. Even so, he could clearly feel that he was standing on something solid.
His Dimensional Sovereign Body spread outward by instinct, but the moment his perception touched the surrounding darkness, it returned to him in broken pieces. It had not been blocked by space, nor had it been suppressed by some ordinary formation. It had been cut apart by something far sharper.
At that moment, Max understood that this chamber did not belong to space. It belonged to the sword path he had chosen, the Emotion Severing Path.
After several breaths passed, Max finally saw something standing within the darkness far ahead of him. It was a black shadow with the shape of a man, but it had no face, no features, no clothes, and no clear body that could be seen.
It looked as if someone had cut a human silhouette out of the void itself and placed it before him. In its hand was a sword also made of shadow, and although the figure stood completely still, the aura around it made Max’s eyes narrow slightly.
That aura was not loud, nor was it oppressive in the usual sense. It simply made the world around it feel empty, as if everything close to it had already been cut away from meaning.
Max did not speak, and the black shadow did not speak either. For a while, the two of them simply stared at one another within the endless darkness, neither side moving first. Then Max slowly steadied his breathing, and the instant he did, the black shadow vanished from where it had been standing.
Max’s pupils narrowed a little as a sword appeared before him without warning, descending toward his neck in complete silence. It carried no killing intent, no anger, no warning, and no emotional fluctuation.
It simply arrived with the purest expression of the Emotion Severing Path, and the sword was not trying to cut his flesh first. It was trying to sever the reaction inside him, the fear that should have warned him, the instinct that should have made him move, and the connection between his mind and body.
"He is also using the Emotion Severing Path?!" Max was shocked. He quickly raised Dragonheart, and the same Emotion Severing Path erupted from his sword as he met the attack head-on. Their blades clashed in the darkness, yet no explosion rang out and no shockwave spread through the chamber.
Only the silence deepened. The two swords met, and the space around them seemed to lose another layer of existence. Max felt the shadow’s severing power enter through the clash, trying to cut through the anger, hatred, resolve, and purpose hidden inside his path.
At the same time, Max’s own Emotion Severing Path struck back, trying to sever the shadow’s sword intent, its rhythm, and the invisible connection between its blade and its body.
Neither side retreated, and in the next instant, they moved again. The black shadow slashed from the left, and Max answered from the right. The shadow thrust toward his heart, and Max turned the blade away before cutting toward the shadow’s shoulder.
The shadow shifted without making a sound, and its sword came from a blind angle that should not have existed, but Max’s Dimensional Sovereign Body caught the distortion just before the blade arrived.
He stepped back, raised Dragonheart, and met the attack with his own severing sword force. Once again, their swords clashed, and once again, no sound appeared. Only the surrounding darkness became heavier.
Max immediately understood what this reward chamber truly was. It was not a simple comprehension room where he would sit quietly and absorb insights. It was a training chamber for the Emotion Severing Path, and the one training him was this black shadow.
More accurately, this shadow was not merely a mindless trial figure. Its sword was too pure, too sharp, and too complete. Every movement contained a version of the Emotion Severing Path that was more mature than his own, not necessarily stronger in raw power at every moment, but far deeper in understanding.
The black shadow attacked again, and Max responded without hesitation. One clash became ten, ten became a hundred, and a hundred became a thousand as time gradually lost all meaning inside the chamber.
Max did not know whether hours had passed or days had passed. There was no sunrise, no sunset, no system timer, and no voice telling him how much reward time remained. There was only the shadow, the sword, the stillness, and the endless collision between two Emotion Severing Paths.
Sometimes Max was forced back. Sometimes the shadow was forced back. Sometimes his sword severed the shadow’s attack before it reached him. Sometimes the shadow severed his rhythm and forced him to rebuild his stance from nothing.
The first thousand clashes taught Max one clear truth. His Emotion Severing Path was sharp, but it was not refined enough. He had used it to overwhelm many enemies because his foundation, sword, will, and killing intent were all terrifying. Against Seraphine, Fin, Morgana, and countless others, that had been enough.